Lucifer has, contrary to my expectations, turned out to be pretty good. It's not as good as iZombie, and I still don't understand why every Vertigo comic has to be turned into a police procedural, but it's a fun show with an engaging cast, a charming lead, and complex morality.

Thad wrote:Lucifer has, contrary to my expectations, turned out to be pretty good. It's not as good as iZombie, and I still don't understand why every Vertigo comic has to be turned into a police procedural, but it's a fun show with an engaging cast, a charming lead, and complex morality.

A lot of it is down to the cast, but it's also writers having the good sense to use that cast in fun and interesting ways. Maze and Trixie is a pairing I had no idea I wanted.

There seems to be an underlying understanding of the characters, too, and the rules of how they work. Like every episode has to establish some completely selfish and often downright petty reason for Lucifer to become interested in the case (in tonight's episode, something as petty as the victim being the chef at his favorite Mexican restaurant). Presumably this will change over time, but for now it's a pretty good and usually funny way of reminding us upfront that this is a guy who's utterly self-centered and only does the right thing when it amuses him.

EW has an article on The Tick. Edlund and the other folks making the show say some good things and some baffling things (Edlund uses the phrase "darker and more grounded"). But I like the sound of serialized storytelling and poking fun at event-oriented comics -- don't forget that most of Edlund's original run on the comic was an extended parody of Frank Miller's Daredevil.

Samuel Barnett is the new Dirk Gently. Elijah Wood is playing his assistant, Todd. Given that Todd is not a character from the books, this show should presumably be telling original stories, like the last one did, rather than adapting the books. But come to think of it I guess I already knew that because I picked up a Dirk Gently comic a few weeks ago that started off with a note that said it takes place after Long, Dark Tea-Time of the Soul but before the upcoming TV series.

I haven't seen Jupiter Ascending. I remember liking Barnett in John Adams, though he wasn't exactly playing a comedic role there.

There is a trailer up for Renfest, a "mini-pilot" starring Mary Jo Pehl, Dave "Gruber" Allen, and Trace Beaulieu. They plan on doing some kind of a crowdfunding campaign to make a 12-episode season in the coming months.

ABC cancels Agent Carter, preemptively cancels the other Agents of SHIELD spinoff. (SHIELD is not cancelled, because I don't know how to finish this sentence.) Also, Castle is cancelled, which is unsurprising given that Stana Katic quit the show, so Nathan Fillion should now be available to do some other project that's definitely not any more Firefly but which he'll probably be pretty good in anyway. Muppets is also cancelled, which is too bad because I thought the back half of the season was pretty good.

Supergirl is moving to Vancouver, CW, a much lower budget, and presumably more crossovers with The Flash. Benoist and Flockhart are the only cast members who've confirmed they're returning so far.

I'm still wondering when the last eight episodes of Angel from Hell are going to show up on a streaming site somewhere. I've always liked Jane Lynch.

I keep hearing "Oh, Stana Katic quit the show because she hates Nathan Fillion" but I also heard "ABC let Stana Katic go to save money" and I feel like the latter version is more believable than Nathan Fillion being a douche but I don't know.

Yeah I thought it was Katic wanting more money, since they were gonna keep Fillion and replace her until they announced cancellation.

Prettttttty happy Castle is over. I used to watch that with my parents when I was recovering post-surgery, and it's one of those shows where they have a completely different writer for every episode, so some are just god-awful while others are great, and the series fluctuates wildly between those extremes. Any running storylines get drawn out for entire seasons, since they start and end with the season opener and finale.

Like, for example, Castle's daughter in the show got accepted to college at the end of one season, and they proceed to spend the entire next season with her worrying about if she's "worthy" to go to the predictably ultra-prestigious school she was accepted to. One or twice an episode, without fail, we are subjected to his daughter having the exact same argument with her dad and her dad comforting her in like twelve different ways, the result always seeming like full resolution until the next episode.

Basically we witnessed twelve different slices of twelve different near-identical universes, each entirely isolated from the other. It was a bit trying.

Anyways one time they introduced Castle's long-lost father, who was revealed to be identical to Liam Neeson's character from Taken, and they RE-DID TAKEN BEAT-FOR-BEAT IN PARIS. IT WAS NOT A JOKE. CASTLE'S DAUGHTER WAS CAPTURED WHILE GIVING DETAILS ON THE PHONE AND EVERYTHING.

Started very strong and continued strong into the third episode. Once things settle a bit, though, you get the sense that you know exactly who is who, what everyone's motivations are, and how this is all going to end up, give or take a few complications. The main character becoming involved with Hugh Laurie's wife just feels really forced for the sake of drama, and I could do with some nuance to the "bad guys."

Grath wrote:I keep hearing "Oh, Stana Katic quit the show because she hates Nathan Fillion" but I also heard "ABC let Stana Katic go to save money" and I feel like the latter version is more believable than Nathan Fillion being a douche but I don't know.

They were separated for most of the latest season, which suggests either personality conflicts or scheduling ones. I take everything I read in entertainment news with a grain of salt; I figure it could be either. Fillion's previous co-stars tend to say nice things about him (and periodically work with him again), so there's that.

(Which reminds me, the first episode of Con Man is currently free at the new Comic-Con HQ site; I've been meaning to watch it. They make you sign up with a credit card and opt out before they start charging you in July; this is why I keep a used-up gift card on-hand.)

Mothra wrote:Prettttttty happy Castle is over. I used to watch that with my parents when I was recovering post-surgery, and it's one of those shows where they have a completely different writer for every episode, so some are just god-awful while others are great, and the series fluctuates wildly between those extremes. Any running storylines get drawn out for entire seasons, since they start and end with the season opener and finale.

There's definitely a sense of diminishing returns with any show of this format, too. If you've seen one episode you've seen them all, so it's largely down to the cleverness of any individual episode's writing and the chemistry of its cast. And the latter was definitely absent this past season, whatever the reason.

Grath wrote:I keep hearing "Oh, Stana Katic quit the show because she hates Nathan Fillion" but I also heard "ABC let Stana Katic go to save money" and I feel like the latter version is more believable than Nathan Fillion being a Bad Dragon but I don't know.

They were separated for most of the latest season, which suggests either personality conflicts or scheduling ones.

For the last couple seasons they've been experimenting with how they want to handle Castle and Beckett's relationship to try to recover their ratings, I figured it just was something on that front causing the separation.

I don't just mean that they were separated as a couple, I mean that they were physically separated. Like, not onscreen together for more than five minutes an episode. The first half of the season was built around a plot where she moved out, but even after they reconciled the back half of the season was still written around plot contrivances that kept splitting them up every week. And there was at least one entire episode she wasn't even in.

I know that the show had a problem with Moonlighting Syndrome, but even as cynical as I am about the thought processes of TV producers and networks, it's pretty hard for me to picture anyone deciding that a good way to bring the romantic tension and the will-they-won't-they anticipation back into the show was to have the two romantic leads stop interacting with each other almost entirely. I have to figure there was another reason for it.